I was a firm believer of the motto "homework is to be done at home" when I was in my first year teaching. But also as a first year teacher, I really lacked an essential trait that all teachers need to have...empathy.

I taught at, let's say, not the richest school. A lot of my students' highest priorities were NOT to get a good, free education, so doing homework was really the last thing they did...if they did it..and it drove me crazy...I took it personally.

"What!? You didn't do the homework...AGAIN!? You obviously don't want to pass or graduate," said some naive teacher.

I think another, maybe even more essential aspect of being a teacher, is to actually KNOW your students. Sure, you spend weeks memorizing their names and who are best friends so you don't sit them together, etc., etc., but I mean REALLY know them. When you do that, you learn "Bobby" works a part-time job after school from 3pm-9pm, then comes home to take care of his little sister because his mom has been sick. Or that 'Julie' shares a one bedroom apartment with both her parents and 3 siblings and the only time she can get to be by herself, with her own thoughts, is by hanging out in your classroom until 5pm (when you were ready to leave the building at 3:30pm). Or that 'Randy' doesn't have any immediate family so he spends most of his time with his teammates on the football team because it's the first time he's had "brothers" that would stand up for him in a fight or give and receive support when needed.

Then it dawned on me...if I were them, I wouldn't have put much thought into homework either! Especially when it feels like it's given almost just for the sake of giving homework, and that's when I had to change my thinking. I was always asking them to do something for me, but never asked what they needed from me!

Don't get me wrong, I also believe there is value in giving homework. There is value in the students trying on their own and to apply concepts presented in class. There is a work ethic and a sense of responsibility to build within the students to complete something on your own time. I'm not here to argue against that. But I'm also not close minded and think there's only one way it should be done, that's how my high school teacher gave homework, or just because that's how I did things 10 years ago in the classroom, it should be the same today.

But there are a few guidelines I followed when giving out homework.

1.) Make it meaningful

Is the target they are practicing on going to be something that they'll be assessed on? I know we're not suppose to teach to the test, but I also want them to be prepared for these standardized assessments too. Don't give it just so you can say, "I give my students x amount of homework for x amount of nights"...who cares!!?? That doesn't make you a better teacher, a harder class, or a better experience for your students. Especially if they're not doing it. It's Quality vs Quantity. Don't just arbitrarily pick "Students, numbers 1 - 100, odds is your homework assignment"

...did you even look at those problems!?!? The first 30 are all the same question!

2.) If it can't be completed in less than 30 minutes, then don't bother giving it.

To me this hits the empathy aspect. My students have 5 or 6 other classes that they'll have work to do. They have sports, work, family commitments to juggle. I want them to do the homework, and if it takes too much time to do, they understandably won't do it.

3.) Don't follow the "Homework is to be done at home" motto... and maybe call it "assignment", not "homework"

Look, if there's 15 minutes left in class, let's get started on the assignment. Look through the problems, identify the ones you know you can do, find the ones that you might struggle with...start with the tough ones...then I'm here to answer questions and help you through it. If they don't have the time outside of class to struggle...then give them that time, they're sitting in your class anyway! We are so willing to help our students, but as soon as it's "homework", it's, "No, no, no...can't help you out with that here or now...that's why it's called homework."

4.) It has to be worth something

I know this goes against my "don't just randomly assign homework problems", but you do have to sort of randomly assign it value. Whether it's marked as "complete / incomplete", or given some score of say 0, 1, 2, if it's not "graded", then it appears to be optional for the students to do. Now when "grading" it, I'm not looking for correctness, I'm looking for attempt and effort. And as any teacher can tell you, we have enough exposure of both classifications to identify a real attempted effort, and a student who simply just copied it down. (and also, it is really such a small amount figured into an overall grade, if you happened to give a student a 2 when they should have gotten a 1, or 0 when it should have been a 1, it's not affecting your assessments of the key concepts when you're grading quizzes and tests).

5.) Be consistent

I made it a routine. If there was going to be an assignment, it would be on Monday's, Tuesday's, and/or Wednesday's. Thursday's were our 'fun' days where we'd play some sort of game to wrap up what we learned at the beginning of the week, and Friday's were the assessment days where you'd show me you learned (or didn't learn) the content, so that the next week I'd re-teach, or could move to the next target.

OVERALL:

I think if nothing else, the key for me to get my students to actually start doing homework was to be understanding, and not give them any surprises. The student's knew what to expect, when to expect it, and knew I wasn't out to make their lives miserable. On day 1, I always tried to portray our relationships as a 2-way street, I can make compromises to SOME of my methods, but they would have to meet me half way, and that we both have expectations of each other...I'll hold up my end of the bargain, if you can hold up yours.

So that's my 2 cents. I'm sure there's other philosophies and things that I do that you may not agree with, but the thing is, I'm open to change and rethink things...I think we all should.

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